Bowie RCA discs

Just what the name says.
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Xenu
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Postby Xenu » Thu Feb 09, 2006 11:07 pm

Crummy Old Label Avatar wrote:Are you saying that the Rykos are simply "bass-shy" or something else?

Am I off the mark here by suggesting that any bass deficiency on the Ryko versions could be easily solved by turning up the bass knob a tad or two?


You guys do have tone controls, right?


Haha. Yeah, we do. It isn't just a simple bass-EQ issue; in fact, I have no idea how the heck something as ethereal as a "bass cloud" comes about; EQing isn't my specialty.

By the way, I'd just like to register something: I've never heard a CD of "Ziggy" that hasn't been extraordinarily thin. The one exception is the multi-channel remix on the SACD.

...double semicolon. Not bad.
Last edited by Xenu on Fri Feb 10, 2006 3:00 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Andreas
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Postby Andreas » Fri Feb 10, 2006 1:04 am

Xenu wrote:"bass cloud"

Yes! That was the term that I was looking for in my previous post.

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Postby Crummy Old Label Avatar » Fri Feb 10, 2006 5:52 am

Ziggy on vinyl always tended to the thin side. The Ryko CD sounds pretty faithful to me. But I haven't owned or heard the vinyl since around 1981, so maybe my memory is playing tricks on me.

I've only ever heard two Bowie RCA CDs: Changesone was the very definition of paper-thin shitty 80s CD mastering, and Diamond Dogs sounds like a murky mess. Never wanted to hear any others. If these two are any indication, I can't begin to imagine why anyone would rate the RCA CDs at all.
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Postby Andreas » Fri Feb 10, 2006 10:27 am

Crummy Old Label Avatar wrote:I've only ever heard two Bowie RCA CDs: Changesone was the very definition of paper-thin shitty 80s CD mastering, and Diamond Dogs sounds like a murky mess.

These two are the best ones among the five I own. What does "paper-thin" mean, anyway, in technical terms?

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Xenu
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Postby Xenu » Sun Feb 12, 2006 1:53 pm

OK, ripping now.

"Paper-thin" mixed without much frequency response. The whole album just sounds toppy. Compare this with "Man Who Sold the World," which is toppy but in a different way that I can't even begin to define.
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Postby Andreas » Sun Feb 12, 2006 2:32 pm

Xenu wrote:"Paper-thin" mixed without much frequency response. The whole album just sounds toppy.

Are you now talking about the mix or the mastering? You confused me here.

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Xenu
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Postby Xenu » Sun Feb 12, 2006 3:45 pm

Mix, I guess.
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Xenu
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Postby Xenu » Sun Feb 12, 2006 5:34 pm

So we have:
ChangesOne
ChangesTwo
Lodger
Man Who Sold
Station to Station
Pin Ups
Space Oddity
Ziggy (Andreas)
Diamond Dogs (Andreas)

All of mine are Japanese discs and US variants, except for ChangesTwo, which claims to be a Japanese pressing but looks entirely unlike the others I have.

Amusingly, this is only 2.5 gigs. Anybody have preference as for filler? I've been throwing the Immediate Singles Collection on basically everything recently.
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Beatlesfan03
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Postby Beatlesfan03 » Sun Feb 12, 2006 6:25 pm

I've got Young Americans if you need it.
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Postby Ess Ay Cee Dee » Sun Feb 12, 2006 6:31 pm

Does anybody have the Sound + Vision box set? I wouldn't mind having all of the tracks that are unavailable elsewhere. Somebody actually uploaded the whole box at OiNK a few weeks ago, but it disappeared when their server crashed.

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Postby J_Partyka » Sun Feb 12, 2006 6:34 pm

Beatlesfan03 wrote:I've got Young Americans if you need it.


Low (Japan) and "Heroes" (Germany) here, if anyone's interested.

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Xenu
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Postby Xenu » Sun Feb 12, 2006 6:58 pm

OOOH, I forgot, I just got Heroes...not properly catalogued yet. OK, add that to the list.

I have two discs of the box (1 and 2, I think...I had three, but it vanished at some point). I also have a good number of Au20s, although those will take up a lot more space than the RCAs (thanks to the 15-bit nature of the RCAs).

J, might you be able to shoot me a quick two-fer FLAC CD of those two RCA albums, so I can include 'em in the compilationment?
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Postby J_Partyka » Sun Feb 12, 2006 8:03 pm

Sure thing ... Just PM me and remind me of your mailing address.

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Postby Crummy Old Label Avatar » Sun Feb 12, 2006 8:24 pm

I meant that the RCA Changesone CD exhibited very toppy mastering. At least that's how i remember it sounding.

The only Ryko CD which I do think sounds "wrong" is The Man Who Sold the World. That one truly is "bass-shy". But I don't think this record has ever sounded "right" to me since the original Mercury US vinyl -- you know, the one with the cartoon cover. (I've never heard an original UK pressing). All subsequent RCA vinyl reissues (US, UK and "RCA International") also sounded wonky.

So how does the RCA Man Who Sold the World CD sound? Does it have that bass presence so obviously lacking on the Ryko?
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Xenu
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Postby Xenu » Sun Feb 12, 2006 9:35 pm

Actually, yeah. "Man Who Sold" is one of the more obviously different examples, in fact.

http://www.lukpac.org/~handmade/width.flac (beware: 2 meg file)
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